10/16/2017

Home Fires Burning - The Razing and Recovery of the Iconic North Bay Region

Having just visited this especially beautiful pocket of Northern California, Napa and Sonoma Counties, its bucolic majesty was still fresh in my mind when I heard the first murmurings of a fire in the area. Wildfires are a fact of life in these semi-arid regions of the State, whose meadows and hillsides often grow emerald green with winter rain and then dry out to a tawny brown soon after Spring has bid her farewell. It is just this characteristic velvety brown landscape that provides one important component for a fire to take hold

The local fire stations and volunteer departments are used to these flair ups. And when one happens, it barely makes the local papers or registers a mention on the evening news. The rapid response of these fire fighters almost always achieves the upper hand before homes, livestock or other precious resources are ever threatened.

But on the rare occasions that there is that perfect storm and elemental forces conspire to create a conflagration of horrific proportions, there is little anyone can do but run for their lives. By the time dispatchers sent the first team to knock down the flames that appeared overnight, it was already too late. Building quietly somewhere in a dark canyon and fueled by what residents call “The Diablo Winds” once fire had made it to the first ridge, in the wee hours of the morning, it had become a seething, monster, determined to leave only stone and metal in its wake.

It moved so fast, that those in its path barely had time to don a robe, gather the children or elderly parents and beat a hasty retreat through a gauntlet of towering flames. Left behind were all the seemingly indispensable minutia that make up a home: Musical instruments, photo albums, heirlooms from generations past and in so many cases, a sanctuary built through loving plans and hands to safely ride out the golden years.

So many chose this beautiful area for retirement. With countless micro-farms, wineries and specialty restaurants dotting the valleys, foothills and towns, living in the Napa / Sonoma area has always represented a captivating blend of metropolitan and rural amenities. The comfortable pace and lifestyle, friendly atmosphere and proximity to medical centers, universities and the economic powerhouses that are San Francisco and Silicon Valley, gave this region the moniker “God’s country”. What I always interpreted to mean, “where God would live, were he (or she), were to ever be in the market”.

Though I now live in Southern California, ironically, what many consider the epicenter of wild infernos, for me, the devastation to the North Bay has left an emotional scar. You see, I once lived there. You might say, I grew up there. Having moved from Los Angeles, in my early twenties, to seek a closer and deeper connection to Nature, I found the environs in which I wished I had spent my childhood. And over the ensuing decades, I came to know it intimately… better than most.

I brought with me that Southern California affinity for the automobile. And with my trusty steed, I would spend weekends on long excursions, in search of new views, lakes, nurseries, wineries, towns or experiences yet to be discovered. One one such trip, I came across an exotic zoo, tucked away in the uniquely beautiful valley that ascends from the windy Mark West Springs Rd. This road wends its way from Eastern Santa Rosa to Calistoga, passing wineries, farms, aging barns, horse pastures, but mostly, some of the most scenic countryside to be found anywhere. At the intersection of Franz Valley School Rd, can be found Safari West. And on this particular day, while joyriding down the road, I glimpsed a giraffe peeking out over a fence. Now, I have seen many odd things in the North Bay: Creative farmers have experimented with raising emu, lamas, long horned cattle and even bison on these productive pastures. But giraffe?

I made a u-turn and indeed, found a giraffe eager to engage with me. Especially if I tempted her with a clump of fresh grass. Soon, her calf appeared. Her head barely topped the fence, but her eyes seemed to capture all that is mysterious and beautiful in Nature with one glance. I was hooked! And in several weeks, I was working there as a docent. The experiences I had and the memories I made during that incredible summer I will reserve for another day. But suffice it to say, I was more familiar than most with that road, having traveled it many times on my way to and from that little preserve in the hills, North East of Santa Rosa.

It is the same road that I recently took my wife to visit for the first time, as I introduced to her the small part of the universe where I grew into manhood and where I left a piece of my heart. She marveled at the countless doglegs and switchbacks that make this highway so fun to drive. With my trusty 4Runner, I took them as fast as I safely could, giving us both the visceral sensation of centrifugal force as we leaned this way and that, descending ever deeper into the canyon. We imagined coming back some day soon in a rented convertible sports car, dropping the top and feeling the fresh wind in our hair as we inhaled the aroma of oak and pine.

But alas, it is that same oak and pine forest that has now been mostly consumed by the fire. For us, the memory is bittersweet. We feel lucky to have seen it just weeks before it burned, but now we gasp at the thought that it might remain only an image in our minds rather than a place we can actually revisit.

What Is Home

This brings me to the concept I alluded to in the title of this article: Home. What is home anyway? This week and in the weeks and months ahead, I and many thousands will need to wrestle with that question. For those who now live and work in this area and who were recently evacuated to shelters, anxiously awaiting word about their cherished property and belongings, life may be forever changed. The economic realities of the area make it such that it serves as a bedroom community for commuters working in and around San Francisco. By the thousands, each weekday, they wend their way south along the 101, like a red snake in the dawn light, to jobs that are not available above the Sonoma County line. For those who have now lost that home, relocation North or South will probably not be an option. The ensuing calculation will go something like this: Move farther North, to Windsor and Healdsburg, where the commute becomes an impossible barrier? Or, move South, into Marin County, where rents and home prices are beyond the means of all but the most well off? The conundrum has no easy answer. And for those who were uninsured or for whom insurance will not sufficiently compensate their loss, the road back to equilibrium will be long indeed. They may need to move completely out of the area and then struggle to find a new definition of “Home”, one that will be incomplete at best.

For me, it is less well defined. Napa and Sonoma county, or what is variously called “The North Bay”, or "Wine Country", was a kind of “Home” I returned to in my mind countless times over the preceding decades. While the intrepid residents of this area will no doubt find the strength and vision to rebuild, it will be many decades, (if ever), before the myriad forests, vineyards, wineries and little farms reestablish and bring back the relaxed and timeless character that I recall. It will take a while to resolve the tension between this image in my mind and what may now be the reality. It may indeed be necessary to return and create new memories there, as the land and the people that love it evolve and heal from their ordeal.

Let Us Learn from Others' Misfortune

For the rest of us, let this be a cautionary tale. Our planet and our climate is changing. Whether you believe that or not does not alter the fact. Whether climate change was responsible for this particular tragedy, no one can be sure. One thing we do know however, is that California now has a year-round fire season. There is no part of this state, or frankly our country that is immune to the prospect of a catastrophic inferno. We must not ignore this fact and change our behavior to respond to this new reality.

1. Prepare your home to resist fire's assault. Remove dry or dying vegetation from on and around your property. If an adjoining home is poorly maintained, try to work with the owner to create a mutually beneficial fire-resistant landscape. Cut down trees or shrubs close to the house, that might catch fire and drop embers on roofs or in clogged rain gutters. Also, keep those gutters cleaned.

2. If you have a large property, irrigate the areas close to the home. On that land farther from the house, for which irrigation would be impractical or too expensive, keep weeds mowed, dead trees removed, and fire breaks, such as roads and dry creek beds well managed.

3. Prepare a suitcase with essentials: Clothing, copies of important documents, cash, car keys, water, etc. When and if you have to leave in minutes, there will be no time to gather these things.

4. Have an evacuation plan in place. That may involve rope ladders to escape multi storied units, easy access to well-maintained vehicles, and at least 2 unimpeded avenues of escape.

5. Finally, look around your home. Make sure you have working hoses attached to every spigot. In the event embers are dropping on your roof from some distance away, you may be able to save your property just by dousing those sparks.

That is what Peter Lang did, the owner of Safari West. Somehow, due to his vigilance, ingenuity and sheer determination, he kept his prize Safari West from burning. In fact, this week, a new baby giraffe was born. They called her "Tubbs" after the most massively destructive fire that raged through the area.

If he can do that with his 400+ acres, then the rest of us might have a fighting chance to save our home a well, if and when the unthinkable happens...

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